Darn it, I don't understand you people. I posted this comment as a test, because
1) it's a shallow unsubstantiated commment
2) it shows a very low comprehension of what actually goes in to computer systems engineering
3) it's cliche, and it took 10 seconds to think up.
And, as I suspected, it got modded up to a 5.
Moderating is like voting. It only works if the voters aren't stupid.
Specialized computing hardware for supercomputers has always seemed like a fiscally bad choice. It'll be good to see what kinds of improvements we can see in research possibilities as supercomputing costs come down from using mass-marketed parts.
"The design effectively creates a perpetual-motion machine, which physicists consider an impossible device."
Um, I call BS. Perpetual-motion isn't considered impossible. We have superconductors, vacuums, and...um..space? Anything moving in space is essentially a perpetual-motion machine.
Is this necessary? Shouldn't prior art be enough for other companies to not be able to file the patents that they're filing? I thought patents were only necessary if you wanted to leverage them.
It sounds to me like the patent system is broken. =P
Man, actually buying online music is starting to look more and more like S&M. I can hardly wait 'till they come out with CDs that come with shackles that have to be worn while listening to the CD.
Obsolete means not useful any more. HDTV hasn't even caught on completely yet, and is still somewhat bleeding edge. Just because we have jet cars that can break the sound barrier doesn't mean that a new BMW is obsolete.
If any countries were looking to visit Mars for exploration/excavation/colonization/etc, wouldn't planning for one of these time-frames be a good idea
Not necessarily. Just because it's going to be closer doesn't mean that that would be the most efficient way for a rocket to get there. A rocket's path would be essentially a big orbit intersecting both earth's orbit and mars' orbit. I'd be willing to bet that the best time to send a rocket is completely disjoint from the best time to look at it through a telescope.
We can't interact as easily in the real world...which makes knowledge as a pursuit much more interesting to us. It also means that being able to experiment with a world that obeys laws we can understand is much more satisfying.
...they'll never get any expertise using it at all if they have to pay exorbitant amounts of money for an OS and office suite.
The average income is $160 a year because most of them live in huts and herd cattle for a living, and occasionally kill each other. Free software wouldn't do them any good unless they have a good business reason to use it. If you consider any reason other than that, it's invalid; they don't have expendable income like we do. They can't just buy a computer to play around with windows and get good at using it so they can go into IT any more than I can buy a plane and fly around in it so that I can become a pilot. They have to have a business that makes enough money to justify that expendature - and I guarentee that if they have a business that makes enough money to justify needing office 2003 over wordpad, they can afford to buy office 2003, just like if I have enough of a reason to need a private jet, I can probably afford to pay for lessons from an expensive instructor.
Even if the software is free, the hardware won't ever be.
Is it possible that Bill Gates' recent lament over the decline of US CS graduates and research spending was merely crocodile tears?"
Well, what would you do if you were sad that there weren't as many highly qualified CS graduates and research spending? I would start hiring people that ARE qualified. I think if you add the two ideas together, you don't get "Bill Gates is an evil man who says one thing and does another", although since this is slashdot, that's the default slant. You get "Bill Gates is sad that CS majors coming out of major US universities suck now, and he's realizing that asian people are smarter and work harder."
I know, but the latecomers have that many fewer pixels. I looked at it when it was 4 hours old, so that means I'm 12000 pixels down from someone who checked it when it was first up.
You won't be able to see patterns very well at all unless they post the original picture so you can do a diff. Does anyone have a copy of the original picture? [Or do you know where a link to it is?]
I think this is a pretty stupid way of doing it. They should have just done it from a blank image. This just gives people who know the original image an advantage.
No, it's not obligatory, you karma whore. Every time "laser" appears in the content of an article, we don't *have* to make a post about frickin' sharks. Believe it or not, jokes get old.
Although, it never fails to confound me as to why they get modded up.
The difference is that they didn't bother to mention that he wrote it. Common courtesy for linking to resources like images or other downloads is to link to the html page that contains the link - not to the resource itself.
One thing that I'll never understand is why we (humans) continue to put important things in the most vulnerable places.
Earth is vulnerable. We have floods, tornados, earthquakes, hurricanes, extreme heat, extreme cold, wars, famines. Humans are vulnerable. We have disease, murder, accidents, etc. Everything is risk management, not risk prevention. As you said, "it serves people's short term interests". That's how we operate. Long term, we're dead. Short term is how we plan. (Unless you believe in a heaven, then you do plan differently)
I mean, I don't know if you've seen much of the "safe" part of the country, but let me tell you, it's pretty boring. I've driven across the US 6 times, and while I was driving through the safe parts, like Iowa and Illinois, I wanted to chew my arm off, but I couldn't because I was too bored.
Plus, with the advent of multi-billion dollar insurance companies, stuff like hurricanes don't seem as devestating.
Oh, yes, downloading music will cause the collapse of the music industry as we know it, because artists lose so much money from it.
My point isn't that pirating music is so bad. My point is that "fighting the *AA" isn't good, or in any way comparable to Gandhi. People get a robin hood complex over this, but I have news for you. Musicians make a decent living compared to most people. And those who don't usually aren't very good. I have quite a few friends who are decent musicians - but I wouldn't pay more than a couple of bucks for one of their CDs. I strongly suspect that your fight for the "freedom of artists" has more to do with you wanting free stuff than an honest humanitarian interest in the plight of artists. Sure, the RIAA makes a whole lot of money. But they do serve a commercial purpose, they are a legal entity, and there are much better avenues to fight them if you think they're wrong then just stealing their music.
Gandhi had no legal recourse besides garnering international sympathy. You do.
First they ignore you. Then they laugh at you. Then they fight you. Then you win.
Gandhi
This is annoying, and almost offensive. To compare Gandhi in any way to the selfish and morally devoid mantra of "I want this for free, so I'm going to construct a philosophical framework that lets me justify stealing it" is completely off-base. The very fact that you're making a comparison like this, and have been modded up to (Score: 5, Insightful) shows me just how few people on slashdot have actually stood for any cause that mattered.
And, of course - creator control of intellectual property, because creators deserve to own their own work.
Great - another arena in which the same mantra will be repeated over and over again. Video game creators can retain control of their IP just the same as a musician can. But they routinely GIVE IT UP for profitability. If they want to do that, that's their perogative. Distribution isn't a barrier anymore, but marketing and advertising is. Without exposure, your art won't be profitable, and musicians and video game designers are willing to give up control for that.
It's -their- choice to do that, not your excuse to pirate the art that they produce.
Slashdot Mirror
Darn it, I don't understand you people. I posted this comment as a test, because
1) it's a shallow unsubstantiated commment
2) it shows a very low comprehension of what actually goes in to computer systems engineering
3) it's cliche, and it took 10 seconds to think up.
And, as I suspected, it got modded up to a 5.
Moderating is like voting. It only works if the voters aren't stupid.
Specialized computing hardware for supercomputers has always seemed like a fiscally bad choice. It'll be good to see what kinds of improvements we can see in research possibilities as supercomputing costs come down from using mass-marketed parts.
"The design effectively creates a perpetual-motion machine, which physicists consider an impossible device."
Um, I call BS. Perpetual-motion isn't considered impossible. We have superconductors, vacuums, and...um..space? Anything moving in space is essentially a perpetual-motion machine.
Is this necessary? Shouldn't prior art be enough for other companies to not be able to file the patents that they're filing? I thought patents were only necessary if you wanted to leverage them.
It sounds to me like the patent system is broken. =P
Man, actually buying online music is starting to look more and more like S&M. I can hardly wait 'till they come out with CDs that come with shackles that have to be worn while listening to the CD.
Like many of us, he is offended by the fact that the fact that the record labels and movie studios treat their customers like criminals.
Well, I'm not sure why he would be offended, since most of their customers *do* display a propensity to steal their music.
It's like being offended that walmart has stolen goods detectors at the exits.
This sounds almost as revolutionary as sun's grid-computing-for-hire scheme!
Obsolete means not useful any more. HDTV hasn't even caught on completely yet, and is still somewhat bleeding edge. Just because we have jet cars that can break the sound barrier doesn't mean that a new BMW is obsolete.
If any countries were looking to visit Mars for exploration/excavation/colonization/etc, wouldn't planning for one of these time-frames be a good idea
Not necessarily. Just because it's going to be closer doesn't mean that that would be the most efficient way for a rocket to get there. A rocket's path would be essentially a big orbit intersecting both earth's orbit and mars' orbit. I'd be willing to bet that the best time to send a rocket is completely disjoint from the best time to look at it through a telescope.
"...so we should strike the iron while it is hot."
So...we're attacking mars preemptively?
I guess it's better than going after Iran. Mars seems relatively defenseless for being named after the god of war.
We can't interact as easily in the real world...which makes knowledge as a pursuit much more interesting to us. It also means that being able to experiment with a world that obeys laws we can understand is much more satisfying.
...they'll never get any expertise using it at all if they have to pay exorbitant amounts of money for an OS and office suite.
The average income is $160 a year because most of them live in huts and herd cattle for a living, and occasionally kill each other. Free software wouldn't do them any good unless they have a good business reason to use it. If you consider any reason other than that, it's invalid; they don't have expendable income like we do. They can't just buy a computer to play around with windows and get good at using it so they can go into IT any more than I can buy a plane and fly around in it so that I can become a pilot. They have to have a business that makes enough money to justify that expendature - and I guarentee that if they have a business that makes enough money to justify needing office 2003 over wordpad, they can afford to buy office 2003, just like if I have enough of a reason to need a private jet, I can probably afford to pay for lessons from an expensive instructor.
Even if the software is free, the hardware won't ever be.
I was midway through the 2nd paragraph before I thought to check to see if it was autotranslated.
Is it possible that Bill Gates' recent lament over the decline of US CS graduates and research spending was merely crocodile tears?"
Well, what would you do if you were sad that there weren't as many highly qualified CS graduates and research spending? I would start hiring people that ARE qualified. I think if you add the two ideas together, you don't get "Bill Gates is an evil man who says one thing and does another", although since this is slashdot, that's the default slant. You get "Bill Gates is sad that CS majors coming out of major US universities suck now, and he's realizing that asian people are smarter and work harder."
I know, but the latecomers have that many fewer pixels. I looked at it when it was 4 hours old, so that means I'm 12000 pixels down from someone who checked it when it was first up.
You won't be able to see patterns very well at all unless they post the original picture so you can do a diff. Does anyone have a copy of the original picture? [Or do you know where a link to it is?]
I think this is a pretty stupid way of doing it. They should have just done it from a blank image. This just gives people who know the original image an advantage.
Could you please stop killing off justices?
No, it's not obligatory, you karma whore. Every time "laser" appears in the content of an article, we don't *have* to make a post about frickin' sharks. Believe it or not, jokes get old.
Although, it never fails to confound me as to why they get modded up.
The difference is that they didn't bother to mention that he wrote it. Common courtesy for linking to resources like images or other downloads is to link to the html page that contains the link - not to the resource itself.
In fairness, maybe we will get some sense and realize that our number one enemy is still the laws of physics, not terrorists.
Don't worry, the Bush administration is on that.
One thing that I'll never understand is why we (humans) continue to put important things in the most vulnerable places.
Earth is vulnerable. We have floods, tornados, earthquakes, hurricanes, extreme heat, extreme cold, wars, famines. Humans are vulnerable. We have disease, murder, accidents, etc. Everything is risk management, not risk prevention. As you said, "it serves people's short term interests". That's how we operate. Long term, we're dead. Short term is how we plan. (Unless you believe in a heaven, then you do plan differently)
I mean, I don't know if you've seen much of the "safe" part of the country, but let me tell you, it's pretty boring. I've driven across the US 6 times, and while I was driving through the safe parts, like Iowa and Illinois, I wanted to chew my arm off, but I couldn't because I was too bored.
Plus, with the advent of multi-billion dollar insurance companies, stuff like hurricanes don't seem as devestating.
Oh, yes, downloading music will cause the collapse of the music industry as we know it, because artists lose so much money from it.
My point isn't that pirating music is so bad. My point is that "fighting the *AA" isn't good, or in any way comparable to Gandhi. People get a robin hood complex over this, but I have news for you. Musicians make a decent living compared to most people. And those who don't usually aren't very good. I have quite a few friends who are decent musicians - but I wouldn't pay more than a couple of bucks for one of their CDs. I strongly suspect that your fight for the "freedom of artists" has more to do with you wanting free stuff than an honest humanitarian interest in the plight of artists. Sure, the RIAA makes a whole lot of money. But they do serve a commercial purpose, they are a legal entity, and there are much better avenues to fight them if you think they're wrong then just stealing their music.
Gandhi had no legal recourse besides garnering international sympathy. You do.
First they ignore you. Then they laugh at you. Then they fight you. Then you win.
Gandhi
This is annoying, and almost offensive. To compare Gandhi in any way to the selfish and morally devoid mantra of "I want this for free, so I'm going to construct a philosophical framework that lets me justify stealing it" is completely off-base. The very fact that you're making a comparison like this, and have been modded up to (Score: 5, Insightful) shows me just how few people on slashdot have actually stood for any cause that mattered.
And, of course - creator control of intellectual property, because creators deserve to own their own work.
Great - another arena in which the same mantra will be repeated over and over again. Video game creators can retain control of their IP just the same as a musician can. But they routinely GIVE IT UP for profitability. If they want to do that, that's their perogative. Distribution isn't a barrier anymore, but marketing and advertising is. Without exposure, your art won't be profitable, and musicians and video game designers are willing to give up control for that.
It's -their- choice to do that, not your excuse to pirate the art that they produce.
If I had moderator points, I would mod this up.